Lucknow, Apr 6 (KNN) The Uttar Pradesh (UP) government has scripted history by recording maximum online purchases by government departments through the Government e-Marketplace (GeM) portal during the last four years.

Reportedly, with this, UP had left behind states like Gujarat, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Bihar, Chhattisgarh and Odisha in ensuring least financial irregularities in departmental purchases.

Additional Chief Secretary of Micro, Small and Medium Industries, Navneet Sehgal said that deals made through the GeM portal had succeeded in stopping financial irregularities involving millions of rupees in government departments.

"Also, quality, transparency and austerity are being preferred in departmental shopping, due to which there are 12,232 government buyers and 1,23,237 697 sellers on the portal, who have made the highest purchase worth Rs 9,442 crore in the country in the last four years," Sehgal said on Sunday.

UP is followed by Gujarat (2nd), Delhi (3rd), Madhya Pradesh (4th), Maharashtra (5th), Bihar (6th), Chhattisgarh (7th), Odisha (8th), Jammu and Kashmir (9th) and Andhra Pradesh (10th) in the purchases through GeM.

The value of purchases made through GeM portal by different states during the last four years are as follows: Uttar Pradesh (Rs 9,442 crore); Gujarat (Rs 4,030 crore); Delhi (Rs 3,145 crore); Madhya Pradesh (Rs 3,084 crore); Maharashtra (Rs 2,545 crore); Bihar (Rs 1,992 crore); Chhattisgarh (Rs 1,992 crore); Odisha (Rs 1,261 crore) Jammu & Kashmir (Rs 1,239 crore); Andhra Pradesh (Rs 1,129 crore); Punjab (Rs 1,098 crore); Chandigarh (Rs 921 crore) and Karnataka (Rs 843 crore).

There are 1,23,697 private sector vendors, including 58,725 micro and small entrepreneurs, that are registered with the GeM portal in the state. They have directly and indirectly provided employment to over 1.25 lakh people.

Various government departments in UP made purchases worth Rs 9,442 crore through the GeM portal in the last four years of the Yogi government including, purchases worth Rs 602 crore in the financial year 2017-18; Rs 1,674 crore in 2018-19; Rs 2,401 crore in 2019-20 and Rs 4,675 crore in 2020-21.

The GeM portal is an online platform with more than 70,000 registered vendors. Thousands of products from these vendors are available at the prescribed rates and standards. There is a clear order of the Yogi government to the government departments that products or services which are available on the GeM portal will be compulsorily purchased from the portal itself.